Mobile network operators are empowering their networks with Internet Protocol (IP) Fourth generation (4G) technologies such as IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), Long Term Evolution (LTE) and the like. These technologies require systems to communicate with each other using a signaling protocol that can support millions of subscribers accessing the Internet via their mobile devices.
One particular signaling protocol using in the mobile telecommunication industry is the Diameter protocol, which enables operators the support of 4G services. The Diameter protocol is a flexible signaling protocol that can be dynamically customized and adjusted to the specified needs of the system, such as the addition of Attribute Value Pairs (AVP's) or types of Diameter server messages. The Diameter protocol is also capable of managing a constant flow of core network signaling in a complex environment with multiple network elements. Additionally, considering that the network operators mainly manage data traffic, voice traffic has become secondary in priority. Such data traffic may include World Wide Web (www), video, Short Messaging Services (SMS), Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS), video chat, video/audio streaming and Voice over IP (VoIP).
Mobile network operators may require: (i) configuration of Diameter protocol solutions such as gateways to connect new elements in the mobile network to old elements in the mobile network; (ii) scalability of load balancers for allowing the network to grow smoothly; and (iii) ensuring that routers route messages from each subscriber to go to the correct destination.
However, in existing systems, each of these network entities operates independently with no information about: (i) the activity rate of other Diameter servers, either in its own network or in an interconnected network; (ii) internal configuration data; (iii) routing considerations of the Diameter servers; (iv) states of connected Diameter clients or servers; and (v) existing sessions' status.
Current Diameter agents in mobile network deployments lack a number of network related capabilities. Such capabilities include, but are not limited to: available means to share configuration information of Diameter agents across the network such that unified network configuration and optimized delivery can be enabled; means to share information about the state of particular Diameter clients and servers to enable network wide optimized delivery; means of sharing capacity capabilities, and current capacity utilization of Diameter network devices; means to share information between Diameter agents; and means for utilizing network wide reliability mechanisms and security mechanisms.